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For many of us, the holiday season is the happiest time of year—but it also can be the most wasteful. According to the Canadian Plastics Industry Association (CPIA) Canadians generate approximately 25 percent more waste between Thanksgiving and New Year's Day.

But if you tread lightly on the earth during the year, you don't have to abandon your green lifestyle to enjoy the holiday festivities. Here are some simple tips for lightening your environment while giving thanks, giving gifts, and ringing in the new year:

The Tree: A fresh tree is a cherished part of the holiday season for many, but growing, harvesting, transporting, and then discarding a tree—every year—can take a toll. An artificial tree made with plastics lasts for years, reducing waste, water use, and cleanup—and it can be displayed for months without the worry of a dry tree and falling needles. New technologies have dramatically improved the look and feel of the plastic needles, branches, and trunk, so it's often difficult to see the difference.

Saving Energy: LED lights, which work for both indoor and outdoor displays, use up to 90 percent less energy—and that can equate to big savings on winter energy bills. LED lights are protected by a lightweight, durable plastic casing that makes them weather-resistant, shatter-resistant, and easy to hang. They also produce much less heat than a glowing filament—and the plastic casing is heat-resistant—so the lights remain cool to the touch, even after running for hours.

Sustainable Decorations: It's easier than ever to find holiday decorations made with recycled plastics. One ornament set made with clear recycled plastics allows you to place small decorative objects inside each ornament for a customized look. In addition, a number of websites offer tips on how to reuse common household materials to fashion your own ornaments and decorations.

Holiday Meals: Elaborate holiday meals and celebrations can mean lots of leftovers. Promptly refrigerating food in airtight, re-sealable plastic storage containers or bags can help keep leftovers fresh and avoid food waste. Storage containers made with recycled plastics are now available from a variety of retailers. And plastic zipper bags or used tubs from margarine or sour cream are a great way to send leftovers home with family and friends after the meal.

Green Gifts: Consider giving gifts made with recycled plastics. Plastics recycling has grown significantly, so it's easier than ever to find high-quality products—such as clothing, fashion accessories, children's toys, furniture, and electronics—that contain recycled plastics. Consider what you'd like to buy, and add the word "recycled" to your online search. There are all sorts of recycled plastic gift options for everyone in the family, so you can give something good while doing something good.

Recycle, Recycle, Recycle: Recycling programs vary across the country, but it's easy to find out which plastics are accepted for recycling in your community. Placing a clearly labeled recycling bin or bag next to the trashcan at holiday parties makes recycling easy for guests. Plastic bags and wraps can be returned to participating grocery and retail stores (such as Wal-Mart) for recycling. And you can close the recycling loop by looking for durable, stylish tableware made with recycled plastics.

More from Plastics Recycling

At the end of January Chemical Recycling Europe was created as a non-profit organization with the vision of establishing an industry platform for developing and promoting cutting-edge chemical recycling technologies for polymer waste across Europe. The new association aims to deepen collaboration with EU Institutions and develop positive industry-wide relationships throughout the whole chemical recycling value chains in Europe in order to boost specific polymer recycling. According to the new organization, chemical recycling of polymers in Europe will need to develop in order to reach the high level of expectations from the EU politicians.

According to the Canadian Plastics Industry Association (CPIA) the global plastics industry agrees that plastic and other packaging waste does not belong in the environment. One recent step toward solving the problem is the historic formation of the Alliance to End Plastic Waste, a non-profit organization composed of chemical and plastic manufacturers, consumer goods companies, retailers, converters, and waste management companies that has committed $1.5 billion over the next 5 years to collect and manage waste and increase recycling especially in developing countries where most of the waste is coming from.

IK, Industrievereinignung Kunststoffverpackungen, the German association for plastic packaging, and EuPC, European Plastics Converters, are organising together the 2019 edition of the conference A Circular Future with Plastics. The two associations, representing plastics converters both at national and European level, will bring together over 200 participants from across Europe, who will work together during two days of conferences, debates and networking opportunities.

Tom Szaky,president and CEO of international recycling company TerraCycle® is pleased to announce he has been selected as a closing keynote speaker at the 7th annual Responsible Business Summit New York, scheduled for March 18-19.

Canada Fibers Ltd. (CFL) and Enviroplast are entering into an exclusive supply agreement to recover and recycle plastic film. According to CFL, the strategic partnership between the two industry leaders is a game changer as the requirement for more Canadian-based plastic recycling solutions has increased following the implementation of China's National Sword policy in 2018 which banned imports of 24 types of waste material, including plastic film.

In a major advance for industry and the circular economy, a team of recycling industry veterans have formed a new company, Circular Polymers, to supply the chemical recycling industry with consistent, high quality feedstock made from post-consumer carpet and other plastic destined for landfill. Circular Polymers' new facility in Lincoln, California will process some 30 million pounds of carpet per year, with plans to expand further.

Indorama Ventures' new recycling plant in Guadalajara, Mexico will be operational in the fall of 2019. Located at the company's Ecomex JV site, in close proximity to their resin production, the facility will include a new plastics washing plant purposely developed by AMUT Group to cope with the necessity of processing very dirty PET post-consumer, landfill-collected bottles. These bottles require a wet-cold-cleaning technology, which has been incorporated in the operation's de-labeller unit. The AMUT De-Labeller on site removes labels, especially the full body shrink sleeves, improving the bottles' quality to go through subsequent cleaning operations.

Sesotec has supplied a multi-sensor sorting line at New Zealand's first PET recycling plant operated by Flight Plastics Ltd. According to the Germany-based technology provider, the Sesotec sorting systems there will secure output quality as well as a continuous supply of PET flakes to the Flight's production line.

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Daly Plastics is one of the largest plastics waste processing companies in the Netherlands. At their Zutphen site, Daly Plastics' subsidiary Caroda Polymer Recovery recycles agricultural and packaging films, with the aim to produce regranulates of the same quality as virgin material. Two Jupiter 2200 and four Micromat 2000 shredders from Austria-based Lindner Recyclingtech provide the recovery facility with the ideal particle size.

Toronto-based Canada Fibers Ltd. (CFL) is building two single-stream recycling facilities in 2019 that will include the most advanced, high-tech fibre and plastics sorting and recovery systems in Canada. In Winnipeg, Manitoba, a completely new 30-tonnes-per-hour facility (approximately 80,000 square feet) is currently under construction and scheduled to open in the fall. In the Region of Peel, Ontario, the existing Peel Integrated Waste Management Facility MRF, owned by the Region, will be retrofitted for 31.5-tonnes-per-hour capacity, with the updated facility (approximately 85,000 square feet) scheduled to open in the first quarter of 2020.

Bulk Handling Systems (BHS) has been selected to supply the front-end recycling system for CarbonLITE's newest post-consumer recycled polyethylene terephthalate (rPET) plant. BHS also provided the front-end recycling system for CarbonLITE's Dallas, Texas facility, which began production in the fourth quarter of 2017 (shown above). CarbonLITE is one of the world's largest producers of bottle-grade rPET.

The L'OCCITANE Group, a global manufacturer and retailer of natural cosmetics and well-being products with five leading brands, and Loop Industries, Inc., a leading technology innovator in sustainable plastic, announced today the signing of a multi-year supply agreement for Loop branded 100 percent sustainable PET plastic. The agreement will see the L'OCCITANE en Provence brand start to incorporate Loop PET plastic into its product packaging as of 2022, enabling it to increase from its current 30 percent recycled plastic to reach 100 percent in its bottles by 2025 and place the Loop logo on all packaging containing Loop PET plastic.

TOMRA Sorting Recycling has announced two additions to their North America product support team. Sean Hyacinth has been added as a field service engineer for TOMRA optical sorting equipment, while Kevin Javier Montalvo assumes the newly created position of customer project manager, recycling. Both team members will work directly with TOMRA dealers and customers to strengthen equipment service and project management throughout North America.

ZenRobotics Ltd. has appointed Wolfgang Schiller as the company's new CEO, effective immediately. Prior to ZenRobotics, Mr. Schiller was the Vice President Electronics Industry at KUKA AG, a leading supplier of intelligent automation solutions. According to ZenRobotics, as CEO, Schiller will be responsible for further developing ZenRobotics' business and accelerating the uptake of intelligent robots in waste management.

The Department of Agriculture and Forestry has announced the Alberta government's approval of the Agricultural Plastics Recycling Group's (APRG) pilot program to recycle grain bags and twine along with $750,000 in funding.

An alliance of global companies from the plastics and consumer goods value chain have launched a new organization to advance solutions to eliminate plastic waste in the environment, especially in the ocean.

January 18, 2019

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Refind Technologies AB, an innovative manufacturer based out of Gothenburg, Sweden has introduced the Refind Sorter, a new modular and flexible classification and sorting solution. It consists of the Refind Mind - the actual classification software - and has the option to include the Camera box and a Sorting add-on.

An alliance of global companies will launch a new initiative to work on solutions to reduce mismanaged plastic waste in the environment, especially in the ocean. The Alliance will be announced Wednesday, January 16 (9 am ET) during a global, live internet broadcast originating from London, UK.

Nestlé Waters North America (NWNA) announced in December that it will achieve 25 percent recycled plastic across its U.S. domestic portfolio by 2021. The company plans to continue expanding its use of recycled materials in the coming years, further setting an ambition to reach 50 percent recycled plastic by 2025.

BASF is breaking new ground in plastic waste recycling with its ChemCycling project. Chemical recycling provides an innovative way to reutilize plastic waste that is currently not recycled, such as mixed or uncleaned plastics. Depending on the region, such waste is usually sent to landfill or burned with energy recovery. But chemical recycling offers another alternative: Using thermochemical processes, these plastics can be utilized to produce syngas or oils. The resulting recycled raw materials can be used as inputs in BASF's production, thereby partially replacing fossil resources.

In the spring of 2018, Plessisville, Quebec-based Machinex introduced its new SamurAI sorting robot, which, according to the manufacturer, has since generated a lot of industry interest. Nearly six months after its launch, the response of the market has been very positive and nine robots have been sold to date. The first two SamurAI in Canada have just been installed in Quebec while six more robots will be installed by next year in Canadian sorting centers. Moreover, the company says they continue to have regular requests from customers who are greatly interested in this cutting-edge technology.

Out of 3.308.300 tonnes of PET bottles placed in the European market in 2017, 58.2% - in total 1.923.100 tonnes (+2.9 % compared to 2016) - were collected. This conclusion comes from the Annual Survey on the European PET Recycle Industry, conducted by ICIS and commissioned by Petcore Europe.

On the 11th December, 2018, 13 organisations from the entire plastics value chain hosted their first annual event "The EU Plastics Industries - Towards Circularity" and presented the status of their voluntary commitments and pledges in front of the media, NGOs and representatives of the European Commission.

A new report by Ecology Center (EC), Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives (GAIA), and Changing Markets Foundation (CM) reveals the presence of toxic substances in all 12 of the carpets tested that were produced and sold by the six largest carpet manufacturers in the U.S.: Engineered Flooring (J+J), Interface, Milliken, Mohawk, Shaw and Tandus Centiva (Tarkett). Toxic chemicals detected have been linked to cancer, hormone disruption, respiratory disease, heart attacks, strokes, asthma, and immune and developmental health problems in children.

Most plastic beverage kegs in the UK are not recycled and often end up in landfill. To overcome this problem, First Mile have teamed up with KeyKeg and OneCircle to create a circular programme which recycles plastic kegs, turning them into new, useable plastic kegs.

December 26, 2018

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The Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) recently announced the release of its seventh annual Recycling Industry Yearbook, providing the most up-to-date information and statistics about the U.S. recycling industry and global scrap marketplace. With a greater spotlight on the industry in the wake of rising trade protectionism around the globe, the publication provides the most comprehensive analysis of where the industry stands based on the most current data compared to previous years. It will also serves as a baseline for years to come based on the new global market realities.

On the 11th December 2018, 13 organisations from the entire plastics value chain hosted their first annual event "The EU Plastics Industries - Towards Circularity" and presented the status of their voluntary commitments and pledges in front of the media, NGOs and representatives of the European Commission.

A local Calgary business has been offering plastics recycling to customers across the City for decades. Now, Friendly Earth Environmental is working with autobody shops across the province to recycle plastic car bumpers.

Plastic is everywhere, and sadly, it often ends up in many green waste bins. This causes composting site operators a lot of problems: they have to carefully separate unwanted bags and other plastic components from the organic waste in order to comply with legal regulations, including those of the German Fertilizer Ordinance (DüMV). However, composting site operators also want to achieve their own goal and offer high quality products to their customers, who are involved in the compost, gardening and agriculture industries.

The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) is the world's leading independent non-profit organization dedicated to ocean research, exploration, and education. Its researchers teamed up with French scientists in 1985 to discover the Titanic, and the organization remains at the forefront of providing essential knowledge about our oceans and atmosphere that helps guide global environmental stewardship.

Royal Canin, a global leader in pet health nutrition, has partnered with international recycling company TerraCycle to make the packaging for their entire product line nationally recyclable. For every shipment of Royal Canin packaging waste sent to TerraCycle, collectors earn points that can be used for charity gifts or converted to cash and donated to the non-profit, school or charitable organization of their choice.

The CPIA (Canadian Plastics Industry Association) has been working with Canadian Government policy makers, technology developers, industry and academia for over two decades to educate, to inform and to disseminate information on technological advances and sustainable industry practices worldwide. Following years of effort, according to the organization, it appears that governments have opened a window of opportunity to bring this well-informed perspective to government policies toward the management of plastic waste in Canada.

TOMRA Sorting Recycling, the global supplier of sensor-based sorting equipment, announces that Nick Doyle has joined the TOMRA team as Sales Manager, West Coast North America. In this newly created position that expands sales and customer support of TOMRA's equipment to waste and plastics recycling operations, Doyle will consult directly with TOMRA partners and customers to implement the right sorting solution to improve recycling recovery rates, increase product purity and boost profitability.

Stora Enso and Sulapac continue to combat the global problem of plastic waste by introducing a demo of a sustainable straw at Slush 2018, a global leading startup event gathering of 20,000 tech enthusiasts. The demo, targeting industrial scale production, is designed to replace traditional plastic straws with renewable ones. The straws are based on Sulapac's biocomposite material – made of wood and natural binders – designed to be recycled via industrial composting and biodegrade in marine environment.

The Canadian Plastics Industry Association (CPIA), The Plastics Industry Association (PLASTICS), and the Asociación Nacional de Industrias del Plástico (ANIPAC) issued the following joint statement after the signing of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) at the 2018 G20 Buenos Aires Summit on November 30, 2018.